Who Are You Doing It For?
Who are you doing it for? While the question is simple, the answer is not always as clear. In order to answer this question truthfully and honestly, you have to understand why the question is being asked.
Taking a hard look at who motivates us or whom we are pushing ourselves for, helps in creating long-term motivation with a higher degree of effort. It’s incredibly valuable to understand your personal motivators. Once you know what they are, you’re able to adjust and use the most powerful motivators to keep you going.
Life is a journey of learning, exploring, setting goals, and reaching milestones. In work and life, we have expectations for ourselves in what we want and what we believe we can accomplish. However, the expectations you have for yourself may not have started with you or, may not be what you want at all.
Is It Just for Others?
Are you pursuing a career or a sport only because your parents told you that you were good at it? Or, are you trying to achieve a certain level of income because someone else told you that is what you need in order to be considered successful? Have you created standards for yourself based on other’s beliefs and opinions? Do you have mental rules and road-blocks about what you can and cannot do, what has for you to happen to be a success, and what you have to do to be happy?
The italicized words represent the language we use to create mental barriers. When we tell ourselves, “I have to come up with original ideas everyday,” “I can’t take time off,” or “It has to be done this way,” we have created a mental rule. Often these mental rules aren’t based in facts, they are made from expectations of others or ourselves. Living your life according to mental rules, with little evidence or experience to support those rules, can leave you missing out on opportunities.
The Problem with Using Others to Motivate You
Relying on others to consistently push us will eventually fizzle out. There will be times where that person will not always be available to you. The people in your life may even burnout themselves if they are always having to be your personal cheerleader.
Some folks don’t just use friends and family as a motivators, but look for other external motivators like money or praise. Relying on a paycheck or recognition from others to feel good about your work may have a powerful effect on your performance in the short term. It’s significance as motivator in the beginning but will eventually diminish over time. This external type of motivation isn’t linked to persistence when faced with obstacles.
Research in sport suggests, that if athletes are motivated solely by winning, scholarship, or money they find less join in their sport participation. Consequently, these athletes are more likely to experience injury or quit earlier in their competitive careers than their counterparts. Motivation falls on a continuum, the idea is to move the primary source of motivation away from external sources (recognition, money, winning) towards internal sources (personal connection, passion, intrinsic satisfaction).
This is not to say that others can’t motivate us — they certainly can! At points during your journey you’re going to need the extra push from mom, dad, a coach, a friend, or a teammate. People in your life who are there for the tough moments are incredibly important and they need to be kept around. Pay attention to these people and keep them close.
However, if you are doing it just for others; meaning you do not get any happiness, satisfaction, or joy from the goals, process, or outcomes you are working on, it’s time to take a moment to reflect.
Do you find any meaning or value from your current journey? Or has it all been to make others happy, proud, or think better of you? This process requires you to be honest with yourself. You can identify your motivators by paying attention to where you look after you’ve completed a project. Do you find yourself feeling a sense of internal reward and accomplishment? Or if you’re doing if for others, you immediately look to others for recognition, feedback, and praise. If you find that you consistently look to others for motivation and praise, need to make the time to find out what’s important to you.
Doing It For Yourself
Now this may sound selfish, but as with anything, there’s a balance. You’re the only one who knows what you value. You are the one to identify what you want to achieve, what you find joy in doing, and what you want your legacy to be. Understanding these foundational points will help you tremendously in all that you do moving forward. Your values and purpose act as a guide to navigate difficult moments and decisions.
If you have trouble figuring out what it is that you enjoy, reflect on your childhood. When you are young, you often take part in the activities that bring you personal joy. If you liked to draw, write, run, create, act, make friends, and so on those elements are what you are internally drawn to. You did not do those activities as a kid to get paid or be recognized by a major organization. You did them because they were personally satisfying. Those activities are very likely connected to what you’re passionate about.
Bringing elements of what you’re personally drawn to into your everyday life will improve your personal long-term motivation. You may not be able to integrate all of those internal motivators into your career, instead intentionally include them in your life as hobbies, side gigs, or activities with friends/family. Doing activities that energize you will improve your quality of life and happiness.
As I mentioned, it is all about finding a balance. You want to make sure that you’re doing what matches best with your personal goals, values, and purpose. But, you don’t want to do this at the sake of losing your positive relationships with friends and family. The people who make a positive impact on your life will continue to influence you and help keep you on your path to personal success and happiness.
The Balance
The ideal goal is to find a combination of motivators that will keep you on track to meet your goals. The most powerful way to achieve your ambitions is to have a strong connection with them. You are much more likely to sustain effort if you feel a purpose in your work. You are more likely use creative solution to overcome challenges with an internal drive.
Great athletes continue to train and reach new levels of performance because they love the challenge of pushing themselves. They are passionate about the relentless pursuit of improving their physical performance. Great leaders are able to get groups of people motivated because they love the act of teaching and engaging with others. They find that bringing groups of people to work for a common purpose to be exhilarating A connection in purpose, values, and goals will lead to long-term benefits. You will be more motivated and more likely to persist for your desired outcome.
Sprinkle in the help of positive relationships and you will be unstoppable. Leverage these relationships for the tough days; the days where you want to be lazy. These people can help hold you accountable. But in the end do it for yourself. Be your own source of powerful motivation.
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